Canadian trio in pursuit of a medal
Blondin, Morrison, Weidemann post third-fastest time to qualify for semifinals
PYEONGCHANG, SOUTH KOREA— In pursuit of a medal, in team pursuit.
Canada’s female speedskaters booked themselves into the semifinal — a four-country bracket — by finishing third in the team pursuit event on Monday evening, with a time of two minutes 59.02 seconds.
Up top — as seems perennially the case — were the Dutch crew, setting a new Olympic record of 2:55.61.
Also advancing were Japan, in second, and the United States, in fourth.
The Canadians — Ivanie Blondin, Josie Morrison and Isabelle Weidemann — set a quick but prudent pace.
“We went into this race with a plan and we executed it really well,” Blondin said. “That’s what brought us through to the semis.”
Both Blondin and Weidemann finished off the podium earlier in the 5,000 metres, placing fifth and sixth. Blondin was more acutely disappointed with her sixth-place showing in the 3,000, where she’d been a good prospect to earn a medal.
“We wanted to make sure that we didn’t go out too fast in the first couple of laps and really build into it,” Blondin said, of their strategy in the pursuit. “We’ve seen a lot of blowups and we’ve had a lot of blow-ups too in our races when we went out way too fast and then we died at the end.”
Which is what happened to the gagging Germans, with whom Canada was paired.
“We really wanted to maintain the pace the entire race,” said Blondin. “That is what we did this time around and it ended up paying off in the end.”
All three of the women come from endurance race backgrounds, making them comfortable in the pursuit when legs start to deaden. The unit has collected a pair of bronze medals in this event at the World Cup this past season.
The speedskating pursuit closely resembles team pursuit in cycling, but on hinged-blade skates, with the three-pack of skaters swinging their arms in unison, nestled in behind each other, and switching out their positioning on lap turns, each taking their spot out front.
“We worked on building corners,” Weidemann said. “We’ve done a lot of work this year in practice, being consistent and working together. Just being really in sync helped us.”
Blondin, her teammates agreed, is the expert at sensing lap pace. “She’s really good at feeling what the lap time is,” Weidemann said.
That made it less necessary to count strides, said Morrison, who is married to Denny Morrison.
“More so on the straightaways. On the straightaways, we really think about being relaxed and then that flows really well into the corners where we build out of.
“We’ve done so much practice this year that it’s not really, how do you hold the lap time? We know when we’re on it, when we’re in sync and flowing.”
In Wednesday’s semis, Canada will be paired with Japan, and the Netherlands with the Americans. The two victors go head-to-head to decide gold and silver.
“I honestly think that we executed a nearly perfect race today,” Blondin said. “But I definitely think we’re able to go faster. We can make it perfect in the future.
“It’s 100 per cent possible for us to bring home a medal.”
In the only other event contested at the oval on Monday, the men’s 500 — essentially a one-lap race — three Canadian entries finished well out of the running. The best showing was Alex Boisvert-Lacroix at 11th. Gilmore Junio and Laurent Dubreuil were 17th and 18th, respectively.